The Great Pumpkin Con
by hxchick
Summary: JJ and Abby convince Dave to carve a jack o'lantern for their Halloween party, but things aren't as they seem. AU, OC.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

The Great Pumpkin Con-Chapter 1

_This chapter was written in response to Kavi Leighanna and Sienna27's Novel and Short Story Titles Bonus Challenge #6_

_Prompt: Someone to Carve the Pumpkin_

**~I meant to have this written before Halloween, but real life got in the way. This takes place in my "Rossi Family World" and it's before JJ and Dave are married. It would fall between chapters 62 and 63 in 'An Unconventional Family.' Enjoy!**

**~I'm hoping to have chapter two posted sometime on Thursday.**

**~Reviews make the world a little brighter!**

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Dave heard his JJ and Abby giggling as they came through the front door of the cabin and it was music to his ears. Knowing they needed a girls day out, and he needed some alone time to finish his latest manuscript, the girls had gone to a nearby town to check out the local farmer's market while he stayed behind to work. From the sound of their laughter, it seemed they'd had a good time and Dave dragged himself out of the study to greet them.

When he stepped into the great room, he was surprised to find them lugging a large pumpkin into the kitchen.

"Hi dad," Abby greeted as she and JJ set the large gourd onto the kitchen island.

"Hi Pumpkin," Dave replied and Abby giggled as he used her nickname while she was standing next to an actual pumpkin. "Did you two have fun?" He asked as he gave JJ a kiss.

She nodded, "It was a lot of fun; the farmers market was Halloween themed, and a lot of the vendors were dressed in costumes. I was surprised at how large the venue was, I expected a few stalls with vegetables but it was a big farmers market."

"Me too," Abby chimed in, "But it was really cool. There were people selling baked goods and crafts and crazy knick knacks. And of course there were tons of people selling pumpkins."

"Speaking of which, we should probably carve ours so it's ready for Tuesday night," JJ suggested. Halloween fell on a Tuesday and both Jack and Abby had off from school on Wednesday for parent/teacher conferences, so Dave had invited the BAU team and Jack to the cabin for a Halloween get together. It would be nice to spend a weeknight at the cabin, since they lived in the apartment during the week, and it was something Dave hoped to make permanent through marriage fairly soon. He thought of the engagement ring sitting in his desk drawer in the study and he wondered when he would finally be able to muster up the courage to propose to the mother of his child. Part of him wanted to drop to one knee right then and there, but a larger part of him was worried about her reaction. After his screw up over the summer, he wasn't a hundred percent sure what her answer would be and he was terrified of ruining their current relationship.

He was pulled from his reverie when he saw Abby grab a large knife from the cutlery block and hand it to her mother. JJ was about to hack into the pumpkin when Dave shouted, "Stop!"

The knife clattered to the table, "What is it Dave?" JJ asked in alarm.

"You can't just cut into the pumpkin! You need to hollow it out first and then draw your design on it and _then_ you can start carving it."

"Hollow it out?" Abby asked, her nose wrinkling in disgust, "That sounds…messy."

"Well yeah, it is, but its all part of carving a pumpkin, Pumpkin," he told her. "Haven't either one of you carved one before?"

They both simultaneously shook their blonde heads, "Mom could never see the point of wasting a perfectly good pumpkin since we lived so far out in the country and we never had any trick or treaters," JJ explained. "And dad…well, you know my father."

"But what about later, when you moved to the city?" Dave asked in dismay. How was it that neither of them had ever carved a jack o'lantern before?

"We always lived in an apartment, so there really was no use for a jack o'lantern," Abby informed him. "What were we going to do, put it out in the hallway? It would have been smashed within an hour."

Dave sighed; evidently he had to give his girls a lesson in the fine art of pumpkin carving. "Go change into something old," he instructed. "Then meet me back down here; you both are going to learn how to properly carve a pumpkin."

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Ten minutes later, JJ re-entered the kitchen and Dave shook his head when he saw her outfit. She was wearing a snug pair of jeans and one of his button down, flannel shirts. The shirt was way too big for her, but she looked great in it anyway. Following behind her mother was Abby, who was also wearing jeans and it seemed she had 'borrowed' one of his sweatshirts, and she too was drowning in it.

"Glad to see you're both willing to sacrifice _my_ wardrobe for this," he grumbled. Ever since they started spending weekends at the cabin six months earlier, the size of his wardrobe had significantly shrunk; it seemed that both JJ and his daughter preferred his clothes to theirs when looking for something comfortable to wear. He still hadn't gotten used to seeing Abby roaming around the apartment in one of his oversize FBI t-shirts, nor could he explain why seeing JJ clad in one of his button down shirts turned him on so much. All he knew was that it was worth losing most of his wardrobe to have both of them in his life.

"Okay," he started, as the girls sat down on the stools on the opposite side of the kitchen island. "The first thing we need to do is hollow out the pumpkin." He drew a circle around the top of the gourd, complete with a little groove for a chimney, and began carving it with the knife. Once the circle was completed, he tugged on it for a minute and the top finally came off. Reaching into the pumpkin with a large serving spoon, he scooped out the 'guts' of the pumpkin and placed them in a bowl. "We'll separate out all of the seeds and toast them later on," he told them as he continued to dig.

Once he was satisfied that all of the pumpkin innards had been scraped out, the debate began on the theme of the jack o'lantern; Dave wanted to make a happy pumpkin, while JJ and Abby wanted a scary one. They finally compromised by having him carve traditional triangle eyes and a smiling, gap toothed mouth.

As he carved the face onto the pumpkin, Dave wondered, not for the first time, how he'd gotten roped into both carving the pumpkin and throwing the Halloween party. He analyzed the events that led up to his agreement of both events and he finally came to the conclusion that the two petite women sitting in front of him had somehow managed to wrap him, one of the most hard ass FBI agents in the country, around their little fingers. He grinned as he carved the goofy mouth, it was totally worth it to be with them and he would do much, _much_ more if he had to in order to keep them happy.

Once he was finished with his carving duties, he found a small candle, lit it and placed it in the pumpkin. They all oohed and ahhed over it for a few minutes before Abby excused herself to go call one of her friends from school.

Realizing that he and his girlfriend, whom he hoped would soon be his fiancé, were alone in the room, he pulled her closer to him. "Have I mentioned how much of a turn on it is to see you dressed in my clothes? They look much sexier on you than they do on me."

JJ gave him a provocative smile, "I was going to wear a pair of your sweatpants with this," she said, pointing to the shirt she had appropriated from his closet, "But I thought that might send you over the edge."

Dave groaned, "It's sending me over the edge just thinking about it," he told her. "Tell me, are you wearing anything underneath that shirt?"

"Why don't you find out for yourself?" She asked, as she walked out of the room. He caught up with her and soon they were heading for the master bedroom. As it turned out, JJ wasn't wearing anything under his shirt.

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Two days later, the small Halloween party was in full swing and everyone seemed to be having a great time. Reid, who was dressed as a chess piece, was talking to Abby, who was dressed as a witch and they seemed to be having a somewhat heated debate about something. JJ, who was dressed as Cinderella, was talking with Garcia, who had come dressed in conservative makeup and a business suit, and Emily, who was dressed as Princess Leia from Star Wars. They seemed to be having fun, as Dave could hear peals of their laughter from across the room.

Of course everyone had complimented JJ and Abby on their jack o'lantern that sat on the porch greeting everyone as they came to the door. The two of them didn't bother correcting anyone on it; in fact, they seemed to take most of the credit for finding the large pumpkin in the first place. Never mind that Dave did all of the hard and messy work, since they'd bought the pumpkin, the credit was theirs. Dave didn't bother correcting anyone; he just chalked it up as something he needed to get used to with living with them.

Feeling a tap on his shoulder, Dave turned and found his unit chief standing behind him, holding two bottles of beer. He handed one to the older profiler and joined him in watching the group for a minute. "It was great of you to host this Dave, the team really needed to unwind tonight." The Halloween season was always a busy one for the BAU team and they had come off of back to back grisly cases.

"It was all Abby and JJ's idea, I'm just the facilitator," he told his boss as he took a large draw from the beer bottle.

"I see they also conned you into carving a pumpkin for them," Hotch said with a smile.

"Yeah, they'd never carved one before, so what was I supposed to say?" Dave asked, "I wasn't going to disappoint them, especially after they brought home that huge gourd."

"Oh Dave," Hotch said, shaking his head sadly, "They know how to carve a pumpkin, they just don't like getting messy so they foist it off on some unsuspecting soul."

"What?" Dave asked in confusion, "No, they'd never carved one before, they were just going to start hacking into it."

"They know how Dave," Hotch maintained, "Trust me, they know because I taught them, they just hate doing it. Let me guess, they pulled out the sob story of JJ's mom not wanting to waste a pumpkin and then they brought up JJ's absent father. Then they really pressured you with the puppy dog eyes, right?"

Shocked, Dave nodded, "That's exactly what they did," he said as a look of dawning came over his face, "They played me!"


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

The Great Pumpkin Con-Chapter 2

**~A HUGE thanks to MaryEllen1960 for her help with this chapter and the next one!**

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"Like a fine violin, my friend," Hotch told him with a grin.

"Why? Why would they do that?" Dave asked, still shocked that the two blonde beauties had managed to get one over on him.

"Again, they hate getting messy and there really isn't anything much messier than carving a large pumpkin. I learned that during our first Halloween together nearly six years ago."

As Dave continued to look stunned, Hotch regailed him with the story of Abby's and JJ's first Halloween in DC.

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As he finished packing the tote bag for the day ahead of them, Hotch heard the doorbell ring. "Can you please get that Jack?" He called out.

"Can't, I'm in the middle of a game," his eleven year old son yelled back, unwilling to pause his computer game.

Grumbling under his breath at his son's response, Hotch made his way to the front door and opened it. "Hi guys," he said and then took in the sight before him. The first emotion he felt was affection for the two blondes standing in front of him. JJ was undeniably an attractive young woman and when she first started, he'd felt a flash of something more than the brotherly affection he felt for her now, but he never acted on that feeling for numerous reasons. First, JJ and Garcia had quickly become close friends, and he valued his electronic well-being too much to risk hurting JJ. Second, almost from the first day, JJ's ability to organize, soothe, quiz and manage both the team and members of the press became invaluable to him and he would do whatever it took to keep her on his team until she was old enough to retire. Finally, he'd started in the BAU during it's heyday with the old school guys and he'd learned from their mistakes that he shouldn't dip his pen in company ink, so to speak.

Along with JJ, Hotch also felt a fondness for her eleven year old daughter, Abby. Before Haley had died they had talked about having another child, and they'd both wanted a daughter, but Haley had gotten sick and died soon after and the dream of another child died with her. Abby was standing before him wearing jeans, like her mother, and an orange knitted sweater with a large black cat in the center of it. He could tell she was trying to emulate her mother by carrying her own small purse, but he doubted there was much in the bag other than gum.

"Hi Hotch, sorry we're late," JJ said tiredly as she came into the living room. "The apartment down the hall from us was broken into last night, and I stayed to answer questions about it."

Hotch frowned, along with feelings of affection, he was also fiercely protective of the two Jareau women and he didn't like hearing that a break-in had happened so close to them. He wished he could pay JJ more, partly because he wanted her to move out of the questionable neighborhood she currently lived in, but mostly because he felt she deserved to make more than anyone on the team with all of the things she had to deal with. He knew Garcia lived in the same building, so he supposed the 'safety in numbers' idea should help them, but he was uneasy about _any_ of his female team members living in a crappy neighborhood. If that made him a chauvinist, he could accept that.

While the two blondes may have seemed vulnerable, Hotch knew that looks could be conceiving. He had been shocked as he he had watched JJ and Morgan spar in the gym soon after she'd started at the BAU and while she hadn't taken him down, she'd more than held her own against the man who was nearly double her size. He knew that public display had worked to JJ's advantage as it spread the word around the FBI that she was adept at kicking ass and taking names and it stopped more than one sleazy agent from asking her out.

Because the world was a dangerous place for children, and no one knew that better than the members of the BAU, Hotch had begun teaching both Jack and Abby some basic self-defense and fighting skills, with the caveat that they only use the new skills to defend themselves. Abby had surprised him by being surprisingly easy to teach and he learned she was able to throw one hell of a punch. God help the person who ever tried anything with her, because they would get one hell of a surprise. As she walked through the door, Hotch prayed that she would never be in a position where she would have to use the skills.

"Hi Uncle Aaron," she greeted as she followed her mother into the room.

"Hi Abby," he said as he affectionately ruffled her hair.

"Uncle Aaron!" She screeched, her hands flying up to her head. "It took me _forever_ to get my hair just right today!"

"Sorry, sorry," He apologized, surprised by her ire. Abby tended to be tomboyish and she'd never really worried about her appearance, at least in front of him. As she pulled a small, travel sized brush out of her purse and began smoothing down her hair, Hotch looked over her head at her mother and got an eyeroll from her.

"New phase," she mouthed and Hotch nodded understandingly; God knew that his son tended to go through about ten phases each week. He shuddered to think what it was going to be like once the boy hit puberty. Speaking of his son, he heard what sounded like a herd of thundering elephants approaching, so he knew Jack's arrival in the room was imminent.

Sure enough, the happy boy came barreling into the room and then slid to a stop in his sock covered feet.

"Hi Aunt JJ, hi Abby," he greeted with a smile. When the two families first began hanging out together, Jack and Abby had taken an instant liking to each other, something that JJ was thankful for because she knew that her somewhat shy daughter had difficulties making new friends. She was grateful that both kids went to the same school and Jack had introduced her around, so she hadn't started all alone in a new place.

It helped that the kids each knew how the other felt about their parents having to constantly leave them to go away on cases. They both knew what it was like when their parents missed birthdays or holidays or changed plans at the last minute because of work and both Hotch and JJ believed it helped them to cope with it and not hold it against them.

"Everyone ready to go?" Hotch asked as his son slid into his sneakers without untying them first. He got three nods in return. "Anyone have to go to the bathroom?" He got one nod in return and then Abby dashed down the hallway. Ten minutes later, they were finally on their way.

They had fun that day; the pumpkin patch they had chosen hadn't been as crowded as they thought it would be and they got to walk around in the fresh air quite a bit. Jack and Abby had gotten a kick out of being taken from the parking lot to the patch in a horse drawn wagon and it made them hyper. Of course they didn't want to stay with their parents, so JJ and Hotch let them run ahead, with the admonition to always stay within eyesight of one of them. While the kids ran around in search of four perfect pumpkins, JJ and Hotch traded parenting tips and stories and commiserated with each other over their children's antics. JJ then made plans to watch Jack the next Friday, while he went on a date and Hotch promised to accompany Abby to an upcoming father/daughter dance at her school.

Finally, after hours of searching, Jack and Abby had found 'the _best_' pumpkins and they soon left the patch to carve them back at the Hotchner house. Once there, Abby and JJ watched nervously as the boys spread newspaper all over the kitchen table.

"Um, Hotch? Don't you just hack into the pumpkin? Why all of the setup?" JJ asked, biting her lower lip.

He looked up at her incredulously, "Haven't you ever carved a pumpkin before?"

She shook her head, as did her daughter, "No, my parents thought it was a waste since we didn't get trick or treaters at our house because we lived so far out of town."

'That sounds like a lie,' Hotch thought but then dismissed the idea; JJ wouldn't lie to him about something as trivial as a jack o'lantern, would she? Jack's enthusiastic voice interrupted his thoughts.

"It's really fun, Aunt JJ!" Jack exclaimed. "First, we open the top of it with a really big knife and then we scoop out it's brains and _then_ we get to carve a really scary face on it! After that, dad and I usually pick through the brains for the seeds and toast them in the oven."

"Brains?" Abby asked horrified, "I thought these were vegetables? I'm not scooping _brains_ out of anything!"

"It's not really brains, Abby, that's just what Jack calls them. It's just the inside of the pumpkin," Hotch explained.

"That sounds…messy," JJ said, her nose wrinkling in distaste.

"It is, but that's why you wear old clothes when you do it."

"Oh," she said, brightening a little, "Abby and I didn't bring anything to change into."

He appraised their outfits, "That's okay, what you're wearing will work."

"No way!" Abby exclaimed, "There is NO way I'm getting pumpkin brains on my sweater, it's one of the last things my grandma Abby made me before she died. You don't want me to ruin my grandma's sweater, do you Uncle Aaron?" Abby's outrage had turned into sadness and by the end, she was staring at him with puppy dog eyes.

"Oh for the love of…" Hotch muttered under his breath, "Jack, go grab two t-shirts from my dresser, please."

"Uh, dad?" Jack asked, looking up from his pumpkin, on which he'd already begun to draw the face, "Remember we're going to do laundry tonight? Do you have any clean t-shirts?" Damn, he knew he didn't.

"Then I guess we'll have to put the carving off for another day," he said resignedly. Who knew if they would be in town long enough to get another chance at this.

"That's okay, Uncle Aaron," Abby piped up. "You wanna carve mine Jack? Then I can take it home and put it in the window."

"Sure!" The boy said, happy to have another pumpkin to scoop out.

JJ didn't say anything, she just looked at Aaron with the same puppy dog eyes as her daughter. "Fine," he huffed, "I'll carve yours too JJ."

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"The next year they tried pulling the same thing and Jack and I ended up carving their jack o'lanterns _again. _By the third Halloween, we didn't even pretend that they were going to carve them, Jack and I just carved them as we would our own," Hotch told his best friend.

"But why'd you let them get away with it?" Dave asked.

"Because each year Abby would cook dinner afterwards and with each passing holiday, her cooking became better and better. Not to mention it gave JJ and I a chance to talk outside of work, and Jack and I never turned down the company of the Jareau girls." Hotch told him. "As crazy as it was, we were a family and it was nice spending time as one."

Dave just shook his head, "I don't know how I'm going to do it, but as God as my witness, those two are going to carve their own jack o'lanterns next year," he proclaimed confidently.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

The Great Pumpkin Con-Chapter 2

**~Once again, I owe a HUGE thanks to MaryEllen1960 for her help with this chapter!**

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One year later…

As the Rossi family made their way to the waiting SUV, both JJ and Abby carried small tote bags filled with fresh vegetables from the farmer's market while Dave carried two large pumpkins, both weighing around fifteen pounds each. With each passing car, he reviewed and refined his plan in his head. He was bound and determined that his wife and daughter would carve their own pumpkins this year, but he knew it would take a miracle to get that to happen.

The key to his plan was implementing it at just the right time. He planned on faking an injury that would keep him from his carving duties, but he knew that if he did it too early his wife would end up driving them all home and he shuddered at that thought. He would rather carve a thousand pumpkins than travel the forty-five minutes back to the cabin with his wife behind the wheel. It wasn't that she was a bad driver, per se, it's just that…well…okay, she was a bad driver and every minute he rode with her shaved a year off of his life. That idea was firmly in the back of his mind as they finally reached the SUV and he hefted the pumpkins into the cargo area.

The drive home was a pleasant one, and the conversation centered on their upcoming plans for Halloween. Somehow, Dave had gotten roped into hosting yet another Halloween party at the cabin, although now that they all lived there he supposed the three of them were co-hosts. Anyway, the holiday had fallen on a Wednesday this year and since the kids had school the next day, it would start early and end early so that everyone could get some sleep before work and school the next day.

Because the three of them were fairly busy on the days leading up to the party, it had been decided that they (and by 'they,' Dave knew his girls meant 'him') would carve the pumpkins as soon as they got home and that's when Dave began to put his plan into action.

As he'd pulled up to a stop in front of the cabin, both Abby and JJ busied themselves with getting the bags of vegetables out of the backseat of the car, while he went to the back of the SUV and got the pumpkins. His girls were talking amongst themselves and only looked up when they heard him yell, "Shit!"

"What's wrong David?" JJ asked as he gripped his wrist.

"I picked up the pumpkin wrong and I think I re-sprained my wrist," he lied as he winced in imaginary pain. A month earlier he had been taking down an unsub when the sleazebag began fighting back. Dave was forced to engage in some hand-to-hand combat until backup arrived and he'd sprained his wrist while doing so. As a result, his claim was believable and he had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from grinning as his wife and daughter examined the joint.

"It _does_ look a little swollen, dad. Maybe you should put some ice on it?" Abby said, concerned.

"I think I will Pumpkin," he said, ruffling her hair affectionately with his 'good hand'. "Why don't you give me the veggie bags and I'll carry them in my other hand while you and your mother grab the pumpkins."

"Okay," she agreed as she hooked the handles of the bag around his left arm. Once they were in place, she lugged one of the gourds into her arms while her mother did the same, and they trekked to the back door that led into the kitchen. Once inside, they set the pumpkins down on the kitchen island and just stared at them, hoping they would somehow carve themselves.

Dave thought of every sad memory he had in order to keep from bursting into laughter at their panicked expressions. They really _did_ hate doing this! "Okay ladies, why don't the two of you get changed and then come back down so we…well, _you_ can carve the jack o'lanterns?"

"You mean you're not going to help?" Abby asked in a high pitched voice.

He held up his 'injured' arm, "Can't honey, I sprained my right wrist and I'm right handed."

"That's okay Dave," JJ said. "I'm sure your hand will be as good as new by tomorrow night, we can just carve them then."

He shook his head, "We have that stupid law enforcement summit tomorrow night, remember?"

"Well what about Tuesday night?" Abby asked, panicking a little.

"Don't you have a swim meet?" Dave asked, wondering if she would actually consider missing it in order to get out of carving the pumpkin. To his relief she looked disappointed and shook her head.

"Oh yeah, right," she said unenthusiastically.

"It'll be fine, I showed you how to do it last year, and I'll be right here to walk you through it. Now go get changed." The last part wasn't so much a suggestion this time as it was an order and his girls walked dejectedly out of the room to comply with it. As Dave made his way to the study, he realized that a few of his shirts would probably bite the dust in the upcoming activity but it would be worth it to have them carve their own pumpkins.

Ten minutes later, JJ and Abby strolled into the kitchen, both wearing t-shirts of his, and they were so lost in their own feelings of dread that they didn't notice his open laptop sitting in the corner of the kitchen.

"So what do we need to do first?" Abby asked unenthusiastically.

"First you want to wash them," Dave told her, and with a loud sigh Abby picked up her pumpkin and lugged it to the sink.

Once the gourds had been cleaned, Dave directed them to cut the tops open, leaving a groove for the chimney, and then it was time for them to hollow out the large vegetables.

He handed each of them a large serving spoon and stood back and watched as they struggled to get the innards out. He nearly laughed out loud at the identical looks of distaste on each of their faces and after a few minutes, with little progress made, he finally offered a suggestion.

"It might be quicker if you just reach your hands in and grab the stuff out," he told them and in unison their looks changed from distaste to horror.

"I'll be fine with the spoon David; I just need to get it free." JJ's spoon was caught on some of the thready pumpkin pulp and she kept pulling and pulling at it. Suddenly and without warning, the spoon broke through the pulp and it snapped upwards. All of the seeds and pulp that were in the ladle part of the large spoon became airborne and it all hit JJ square in the face.

Dave wasn't sure who was laughing the hardest in the kitchen after that, but he knew that both he and Abby were nearly incoherent for a full three minutes after it happened. During those three minutes, JJ just stood there with pumpkin guts dripping from her hair and face, seemingly shocked by the fact that the event had actually just happened.

Once she caught her breath, Abby began teasing her mother between her fits of laughter. "Oh my God mom, oh my God!" She said breathlessly, "That was the funniest thing I've ever seen! Oh my God, the look on your face was just priceless!" She had to pause to laugh and then when she picked up again, she looked at her father. "The look on her face, it looked just like this!" Abby mimicked her mother's shocked expression and it sent Dave back into a fit of laughter. "And the sound the stuff made as it hit you, well that was-" Abby's reenactment was cut off by a handful of pumpkin hitting her in the right side of the head. Shocked, she slowly turned and stared at her mother, who was now wearing a self-satisfied smile on her face.

"How funny did you think _that_ was?" She asked, laughing at the pumpkin that was slowly falling from her daughter's hair.

"I…I can't _believe _you did that!" Abby said, both shocked and appalled.

"It's not so funny now, is it?" JJ smirked. The smile fell from her face as her daughter reached into her own pumpkin and grabbed a large handful of seeds and pulp. "Don't you dare," she warned.

"What? I shouldn't do this?" Abby asked as she threw the contents of her hand at her mother.

The slimy insides caught JJ full in the neck and upper chest and she gasped in shock. "Oh, it's on!" She said as she narrowed her eyes and reached into her own pumpkin.

"It's _so _on!" Abby replied back, reaching into her own pumpkin.

Once the food had initially begun to fly, Dave had taken a few steps backwards out of range and watched, fascinated. Now that it looked like an all-out war was about to begin, he knew he had to say something. "Come on now ladies, you both got your revenge. Let's just end this and finish carving the jack o'lanterns."

Neither of them gave any indication that they'd heard him. Instead, the kitchen looked like something out of a western; both of them were standing with handfuls of pumpkin guts and they were both glaring at each other, as if daring the other to make the first move. Suddenly Dave saw his daughter twitch and the kitchen erupted into a full-on pumpkin war. Over the next ninety seconds, seed and pulp flew through the air at amazing speeds, hitting their targets with stunning accuracy. After a minute and a half of standing at the back of the kitchen in both fear and amazement, Dave finally decided to make a move to end the hostilities.

He crept alongside the war zone, all the while being careful to not get caught in the cross fire. There was finally a break in the battle as they both ran out of ammunition at the same time. Taking advantage of the cease fire, Dave ran to the kitchen island, grabbed a pumpkin in each hand and ducked back out, setting the now hollow gourds on the kitchen counter. As he turned around, he saw his wife and daughter staring at him in shock and he immediately realized his mistake.

"You picked up the pumpkins!" Abby said, covered in pumpkin entrails. She had pumpkin weaved throughout her blonde hair, there was a massive amount on her face, chest and bare arms, and there was a large glop of it hanging from her right earlobe. As much as he wanted to laugh out loud when he saw her, he knew he was busted and he needed help.

"How were you able to pick up the pumpkin David?" JJ asked in an accusing tone. She looked just as bad as their daughter; maybe even worse, as she was also covered in the orange goo and there was a large clump of pumpkin seeds stuck to her left cheek.

"Now ladies," Dave said nervously as he backed up to the entrance of the kitchen, "Let's just calm down." He felt his hip hit one of the counters and without looking, he reached behind him and hit a button on the laptop. Both Abby and JJ were amazed to see Garcia, Jack and Hotch on the screen, and all of them were laughing so hard, they were barely making any noise.

"What the hell?" JJ asked, in shock. "What's going on?"

"I'll tell you what's going on, Cupcake. You've been had!" Penelope said, guffawing loudly.

"WHAT?" Both she and her daughter asked in unison.

Hotch, who was wiping tears of mirth from his face, nodded. "You and Abby got away with 'not knowing how to carve a pumpkin' with Jack and I, but your husband wasn't going to let it slide, especially when he learned the two of you had been doing that for the past six years."

"Oh my God Aunt JJ!" Jack nearly squealed with laughter. "When that spoonful of pumpkin hit you in the face…I thought I was going to wet my pants from laughing so hard!"

"You and me both, kid," Dave said with a large grin.

"So your wrist isn't sprained?" Abby asked her dad, as everything began to click into place in her brain.

He shook his head, "Nope, its right as rain."

"And this was all just a setup?" JJ asked.

This time he nodded, "Yup, although I never imagined it would go this well!"

"And you were all in on it?" JJ asked the group on the other side of the laptop.

"No way sweetie!" Penelope said, violently shaking her head. "This was all tall, dark and handsome's idea, we just came for the show!"

"Remember last year, when you scared the ever-loving hell out of me with your fake boyfriend? Remember how I said that payback would be a bitch? How does it feel?" Dave asked his daughter smugly.

Both JJ and Abby just shook their heads, smiling slightly.

Still grinning, Dave moved towards the laptop. "As fun as this is, I think we should let them get cleaned up."

"Spoilsport!" The three said in unison, still chuckling over what they had witnessed. With a push of a button, Dave turned the laptop off and faced the two women in his life. To his surprise, they didn't look angry, instead they looked like they were telepathically plotting something, and THAT scared the hell out of him.

"Okay, we're even now," he said nervously. "Do you guys forgive me?"

The two pumpkin covered women exchanged a glance and then in unison, they both broke into large grins. "Of course we forgive you David!"

"We love you dad," Abby said brightly. With that, they both advanced upon him and pulled him into a giant, pumpkinny embrace. With a sigh, he returned the hug, feeling the pumpkin seeds and pulp transfer from their hair and clothes onto his. It turns out he lost three shirts to the pumpkin carving that day, but as he held his wife and daughter in his arms, he knew it was more than worth it.

**The End**

* * *

**_A/N: And now for some shameful self-promoting...I've been nominated for the _****Profiler's Choice Criminal Minds Awards **in numerous categories, including best overall author (which I REALLY wasn't expecting), best OC driven story and a bunch of other ones. Please check out the final ballot at http:/ / forum. fanfiction .net /topic/74868/33067839/1/ (remove the spaces). Be sure to vote before November 30, 2010!


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